>>14389052It's a term for any strategic game with multiple "updates/releases." There's a common design mistake where, either to keep people using new releases over old ones or in an attempt to make new releases have an advantage over / compete with old ones, they'll accidentally make each new release stronger than the previous one.
This is usually subtle from release to release, though has a profound effect over time.
For example, the familiar Charizard card that used to be powerful in the Pokemon TCG is now pretty much useless, outclassed indirectly by many things and directly by Magmortar lv.X (pic related.)
Pokemon power creeps on three scales -- offensive power, defensive power, and BST (Base Stat Total.)
Gen 2 avoided offensive creep by introducing Dark type to balance Psychic, but defensive creep spiked with the introduction of Steel type, Blissey, and Sleep Talk.
Gen 3 introduced a lot of offensive threats to counter this defensive creep, but as a result Gen 3's creep was almost entirely along BST lines. OU suddenly gained 5 Pokemon with BSTs of 600 (legendaries and psuedo-legendaries) and 4 with BSTs of 580 (40 higher than previous queen of BST Blissey.)
Gen 4 split physical and special attacks, which while it made the game even more offensive, also repurposed stall methods, and generally it was a pretty equal move. However, by introducing a lot of new moves that had BPs of over 100, offensive threats became a lot stronger. (Smogon moved a lot of stuff to Uber this gen, actually. The number of Pokemon in Ubers doubled.)
Gen 5 made weather more powerful for offensive creep, introduced a lot of Pokemon with high BSTs, and created absurd new walls like Ferrothorn and Jellicent. We saw more power creep in gen 5 than any other generation.
